[Review #1] Counter Strike: Global Offensive [PC Version]

Sins · 02-10-2015, 07:35 PM

[Review #1] Counter Strike: Global Offensive

Steam Description:

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS: GO) will expand upon the team-based action gameplay that it pioneered when it was launched 14 years ago.

CS: GO features new maps, characters, and weapons and delivers updated versions of the classic CS content (de_dust, etc.). In addition, CS: GO will introduce new gameplay modes, matchmaking, leader boards, and more.

"Counter-Strike took the gaming industry by surprise when the unlikely MOD became the most played online PC action game in the world almost immediately after its release in August 1999," said Doug Lombardi at Valve. "For the past 12 years, it has continued to be one of the most-played games in the world, headline competitive gaming tournaments and selling over 25 million units worldwide across the franchise. CS: GO promises to expand on CS' award-winning gameplay and deliver it to gamers on the PC as well as the next gen consoles and the Mac."

Cost:

$14.99 (USD) (Goes on sale often, 7 or less often.)

Summary (7/10):

Counterstrike is a game that slowly ravages and pulverizes your soul each and every time you play it.

CS:GO (It's abbreviation) is a high impact, fast or slow action FPS. It requires you to use your brain, which sets it apart from most of todays run-and-gun shooters. It also has a low system requirements, which mean anyone can play it, even from their potato computers. (yes that's you!) I recommend CSGO for players who are tired of the randomness of other FPS games, and want a strategy based shooter. It is a very popular e-sport too, so if you can make to the big leagues you have a chance of making double or triple what other shooters accumulate.

Gameplay (8/10) :

The gameplay in CSGO is what makes it extremely popular. The main goal of the game is to out-smart the other team, and win 16 of the 30 rounds. (1 more than half the total, means the other team cannot get enough rounds won to beat them). There are plenty of play styles to choose from, and if you're used to running and gunning, well you can almost do that in CSGO, with the SMG section of the buy menu. I personally recommend moving away from that play style when you move to CSGO, as it will inhibit how far you will get in the competitive side of the game, as users with skill with AK's or AWP's can 1-shot kill you.

Currently, Global Offensive features five game modes for online play:

Classic Casual and Competitive: Counter-Strike's most played game mode, both involving Bomb Scenario and Hostage Scenario missions. At the start of each round, players can purchase weapons and gear with money earned from various actions, from assisting on kills to completing objectives. Regardless of mission type, a round ends when one team completes an objective, eliminates the other team, or lets the timer run out. If the timer runs out before one of these objectives are completed, the team which did not need to complete an objective wins.
- Bomb Scenario: the Terrorists must plant a C4 explosive at one of two designated bombsites and protect it until its countdown finishes and detonates; the Counter-Terrorists must prevent the bomb from exploding, either ensuring that the terrorist team does not plant it or defusing it once it is planted. If the team does defuse it, the CT team will still win regardless how many enemy team members are still alive.
- Hostage Scenario: the Counter-Terrorists must rescue hostages from the Terrorists, and bring them to an extraction point; the Terrorists must prevent the hostages from escaping. If a Terrorist or Counter-Terrorist attempts to kill hostage, they will suffer a heavy cash penalty. An update later changed how Counter-Terrorists rescue hostages: instead of leading them around, players must carry one hostage at a time to the extraction point.

Arms Race: a deathmatch-based mode where each player is rewarded for each kill with a new weapon. The first player to get a kill with the golden knife, the final weapon on the list, wins the game.
Demolition: a round-based mode that removes weapon and equipment purchasing, instead rewarding players who manage at least one kill by giving the next weapon in a predetermined set of weapons. After a second kill with that weapon the players are also rewarded a grenade along with their new weapon for the next round. This is something similar to the bomb scenario mission, which also requires one of the team to detonate the bomb site. But unlike the casual ones, these have only one bomb site.
Deathmatch (added on November 12, 2012): a mode consisting of 10-minute matches. Players must gain the highest possible score by earning kills with different weapons or desired weapons. The number of points from a kill depends on the weapon. Players may also take advantage of bonus timers for different weapons, or using knife to score extra points. Like in Arms Race, players automatically respawn after being killed, but also when they choose to respawn with bonus weapons.

[*]Global Offensive also offers two offline modes: Offline with Bots, which offers the same game modes with AI-controlled bots; and a Weapons Course, a single player map serving as a tutorial and a training mode.
(source)

System Requirements (9/10) :

The system requirements are fairly simple, as the game is based on the old source engine, which was made to run on old PC systems with nearly ancient technology. This means that almost any computer nowadays can run the game, at least at the lowest settings, don't expect a beautiful game from a potato. These requirements are only beaten by games such as minecraft, or unturned, where the resource load isn't nearly as heavy.

Here are the listed requirements from the steam store itself:

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 or AMD Phenom X3 8750 processor or better
OS: Windows 7/Vista/XP
Memory: 2 GB RAM
Graphics: Video card must be 256 MB or more and should be a DirectX 9-compatible with support for Pixel Shader 3.0
DirectX: Version 9.0c
Hard Drive: 8 GB available space

Art & Sound (6/10) :

The art style of CSGO isn't exceptionally good, especially compared to other games such as Battlefield, or Call of Duty, yet the users don't complain about the art, as the style brings a nostalgic feeling to the older game Counter Strike Source. I personally love how the developers at Valve have made user-made content, and weapon skins, a part of the game. You can submit your own artwork as a weapon skin, or a map itself, and users then vote for it to be added to the game. I also like how they are constantly updating these assets, just last week they updated the animations of everything, meaning the game seems more realistic, compared to some of the old animations, like how your gun would stick through a wall, in real life that's nearly impossible without breaking the wall Tongue

Here is some artwork for the game (link)

Here you can find user made content (link)

Community (2-5/10) :

The community in CSGO contains a vast amount of people who will tell you to just quit the game, uninstall, and even kill yourself as well as the normal FPS sayings like I did your mom. Those things are unavoidable, which is why I give the community a start rating of 2. If you somehow make it past that part of the community (teach mi senpai plz), then you will get to the 5 rating of the community, where everyone is average, and reminds you why FPS games are absolute trash and how you need friends to play with because solo-queing for a comp is like asking to get trolled. The community is also amazing in the sense that what we ask for, gets added to the game. This is in part to the money we users spend on CSGO (somewhere in the millions annually I'm sure) and the dedication of the developers to make the game user-based instead of what they think should be, of course there are exceptions, such as that stolen content is illegal and unjust meaning they will do all they can in their power to remove said stolen content.

This concludes my review of CSGO, if you have any questions feel free to post them below, and PLEASE, discuss this game! I personally have over 800 hours into CSGO alone, and around 1000 more in CSS, and CS 1.6. I really recommend this game for anyone, even for just messing around. If you would like to play with me, my account can be found >>Here<<

-Sins

this is my thread from SF/Nulled

[Review #1] Counter Strike: Global Offensive [PC Version]

Submitted by Sins, 02-10-2015, 07:35 PM, Thread ID: 10832